Body Liberation Tells Morbidly Obese People To Stay Fat! It’s Evil !
Since I embraced body liberation, I have spent a lot of time with my head in my hands. I’ve read so many misconceptions, half-truths and outright lies, and it frustrates me no end. One of the ones that riles me the most is people who insist that body liberation tells morbidly obese people to stay fat. This is flat-out wrong! Let’s correct the errors, shall we?
Body Liberation Does Not Focus On Weight
One of the reasons I moved from body positivity to body liberation is that it moves the focus away from our bodies. Body liberation encourages us to see ourselves as more than a body and focuses on everything that’s wonderful about us as people.
Are you an artist. Do you make fabulous cakes, are you kind, funny, intelligent, empathetic, and so on? all of these things are so much more important than how your body looks. Saying body liberation tells morbidly obese people to stay fat is a lie!
Body Positivity Does Not Tell Anyone To Stay Fat
Body positivity does focus on our bodies; it’s true. However, it actually preaches that loving and accepting your body should not be dependent on your body being a particular size. Trust me; I can tell you that hating yourself thin will never work. It will also leave you with major self-esteem issues and possibly depression.
This hatred is magnified by the generally shitty way society treats fat people. We receive hate, abuse and discrimination in areas that our weight has zero effect. For example, getting a job with no physical component, getting promoted, eating at a restaurant and clothes shopping.
I’m not telling you to lose weight or not to. I’m saying focus on accepting and loving your body first and then decide.
What Is Healthy And What Isn’t Is Is Broader Than You Think
Weight loss is a multi billion pound industry. Doctors, plastic surgeons, bariatric surgeons, diet companies, gyms and a whole host of others have a vested interest in making us feel we need to lose weight.
Even government bodies aren’t exempt. In 1998, the National Institutes of Health adjusted the BMI categories meaning approximately 25 million Americans who had been classed as healthy were suddenly overweight.
I’m not saying that there aren’t both very low weights and very high weights which can contribute to health problems but many of the people being urged to lose weight have normal health markers.
What Does Body Liberation Say?
The Center for Health and Wellbeing at Vermont University puts it far better than I ever could:
“All bodies are worthy and all bodies deserve respect. Period. We define body liberation as the freedom from social and political systems of oppression that designate certain bodies as more worthy, healthy, and desirable than others. We do not believe that bodies that are white, able-bodied, cisgender, thin, or fit are superior, worthier, or inherently healthier than any other bodies.”
In essence, no matter what body a person has be a nice human and don’t treat them like sh*t. Not much to ask, is it?
Takeaways
I think any movement that teaches people to love themselves is a very, very good thing. However, I believe it really pisses other people off to see a person in a socially unacceptable body who is happy in their own skin. I think this contributes to a lot of the hate that fat people have to put up with.
If you’re one of these people, here’s a few things for you to chew on:
- Fat people know they’re fat. You’re just being an asshole by rubbing our faces in it
- It has been proved over and over again that fat shaming does not help a person lose weight. In fact, it usually has the reverse effect.
- By being a jerk to fat people, regardless of the reason, you could serious impact both their mental and physical health. Bullying leads to depression. Depression leads to negative thinking spirals. Negative thinking can lead to a host of physical ailments
- In short, you’re not going to help, you could do harm, so just be nice. Ok?
